So on Friday, I shuttled the dog out to Maple Ridge (to the amazing Erin, who takes the worlds best care of my crazy dog), packed up my garb, my loom, my camera and headed down to Monroe, WA for Ursulmas, a super awesome SCA faire with a great heavy fighting tournament.
Before people start judging: This was planned long prior to the “Ok, Nick & I need to stop hanging out” decision, I already had the time booked off work, and for reasons I’ll mention later, it was super important for me to be there.
Anyway, so Richard, Nick, Euan & I loaded up the van and headed down to the border. We arrived at the hotel pretty early, and even managed to get some socializing in on Friday night. Saturday morning found us at the event bright and early. Nick & Richard both did very well in the tournament, Nick going 12 wins/8 losses, and Richard going 15/5. Nicely done! I had an excellent time running around like a maniac keeping them both hydrated and taken care of, attempting to record (with the slowmo camera) every fight I could, and even managing to socialize a bit in the process.
This may have been responsible for my knees completely giving out last night. I had trouble with my knees a lot last summer & fall, and it finally occured to me what was responsible. So Ursulmas takes place in an extremely large show barn with cement floors, and packed dirt over said cement floors. The packed dirt wasn’t any better than the cement floors, and with the amount of running around I did… yeah, no surprise. It also occured to me that my knees haven’t bothered me in … about 3 months or so. You know, around the time I moved out of Nick’s place… with the cement floors? I swear, I think a lightbulb actually appeared over my head.
Saturday night included more socializing, including complaints to the hotel lobby about the racket we were making. Oops. I didn’t stay up too late, although I was greatly amused to wake up at around 3am, glance over at the other bed and see Richard passed out face down fully dressed. How is that comfortable?
Saturday morning found us back at the fair for another tournament… and for one more little extra bit of fun (and the main reason I came, aside from “awesome weekend with people I care about at an event I enjoy”): Nick received a fabulous new squires belt from Viscount Sir Ieuan Gower. (Pic from Euan, who had a better view than me — I was behind Nick with Argyle, Nick’s new squire brother — and who wasn’t more than a little verklempt about the whole matter. Pardon me a moment, speak amongst yourselves…)
No matter what problems we’ve had… I love Nick dearly, I’m intensely proud of the hard work he’s put into his fighting, and I think he’s found a great fit with Ieuan (who’s a pretty awesome guy himself). And quite frankly, I’ve worked damn hard to help Nick out with that. Nick started heavy fighting seriously around the same time that he & I got together, so I’ve been a part of this right from the beginning. No matter what’s going on with me & Nick, I would have been devastated to have missed this. He (and Richard, among others) are still my SCA family, and I’m not giving that up. I love taking care of my boys, and until I strap on my own armor (NEVER GOING TO HAPPEN) their wins are my wins.
As an aside: huge thanks to both Richard & Nick for making me feel appreciated for my efforts, too. I do it because I love it, but the appreciation makes it worth it. I totally wrecked my knee for them, and I’d do it again in a heartbeat. (Justice might not feel the same way when it takes me a few days to get back to our marathon walks. Walking a whopping 6 blocks home from dropping off the van tonight proved impossible — I took the bus. I am a pansy. Also, it seems like a bad idea to be forced to sit down incapacitated in the middle of East Vancouver…)
There were a couple of injuries: Along with my screwed up knee, I may have accidently punched Nick in his already badly sprained finger while trying to help him lace his boots… which he couldn’t do because of his badly sprained finger… oops. My bad. He also took a nasty shield hook on the fingernail. Nick managed some self surgery to relieve the pressure (no, I don’t want that needle back), but I suspect he’s going to lose the nail.
Anyway. It was a fantastic weekend. It was awesome to hang out with Nick in a drama free fashion, and yes I’m going back to “limited contact” since this seems to be working for us pretty well for now. But I have lots of hope that future events will go as smoothly, and I am cautiously optimistic that I’m not going to lose the stuff that I love the most about the SCA.
But overall? I think this smile sums it up:
awesomeness!! as for richard….pix or it didnt happen lol